


Gale [Book II]

by deltachye



Series: Tales of the Wind [2]
Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Drabble Collection, F/M, Reader-Insert, Romantic Angst, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-25
Updated: 2016-08-25
Packaged: 2018-08-16 20:17:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 30
Words: 2,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8116015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deltachye/pseuds/deltachye
Summary: [reader x haymitch abernathy, ages 13-15] [book II/IV of "Tales of the Wind"]The years of being a teenager are dangerous. A strong wind to make you and the others worry; will you be okay? Can you stand on your own? Can you find your way back home? In this case... can you find your way out of insanity?





	1. I - Growth Spurts

* * *

 

Only footsteps outside of the Training Academy’s lot, Haymitch was ambushed by a flash of colour and a squeal of happiness.

“Hey,” he greeted, lacking enthusiasm when you detached yourself from him.

It could only be helped. Two straight years of learning how to kill somebody was a _little_ damaging to the mind.

“You got tall,” you noted, your eyes flickering with understanding as you looped your arm through his. “Aren’t you a handsome fellow.”

He pretended to flip his hair like a typical Capitol asshole, making you laugh. A growth spurt was good for one thing, he supposed.


	2. II - Guitar Lessons

“What’s that?”

Haymitch gestured towards the strange object in your hands as you strode up to him. It was dirty and cracked along the side, and had several strings running up the length of it.

“I dunno. Greasy Sae said her great-great grandfather used to make music out of it.”

“Music? With _that_?”

“It’s probably not hard... C’mon, try!”

He did, and found that pressing different places on the rigid metal gave different pitches. He didn’t notice you humming a song until he stopped, where you stopped too — probably out of embarrassment. He continued playing so you could keep singing.


	3. III - Fitting In

You always claimed you never fit in.

“I don’t have the right hair. My eyes are weird. My facial structure is off. This shirt makes me look fat.”

It would go on and on from you. You spouted insecurity after insecurity to him, complaining about how girls from the higher districts looked like models and you resembled a rotten vegetable.

He didn’t mind. He didn’t care. His hand fit in yours well enough.


	4. IV - Time of Month

Haymitch could confidently tell anybody that you were his best friend, and he could confide with you everything that he couldn’t tell anybody else. However, he hadn’t expected you to tell him you were bleeding out of your vagina.

“So… sorry for being awkward?” you bounced on your heels once, nervously.

“…yeah.”


	5. V - Hit and Miss

Haymitch never experienced awkward silences with girls, because he never spoke to any other one except you. You always filled gaps in conversation by yourself, so he was shitting himself talking to the ‘Prettiest Girl in 12’.

“I bet you like really pretty flowers… but none are, um, prettier than you. Yeah.”

Millicent-Raine promptly slapped him, and he heard a guffaw burst from behind a shrub. 

Maybe he should just stick to isolation — though isolation without you was gloomy as well.


	6. VI - Blushing

Haymitch had a habit of having restless hands. He could sit in a chair for five hours but would fidget even at gunpoint, earning him a bad reputation with teachers.

He hadn’t realized he was making a flower crown out of intricate little yellow wildflowers until he placed it on your head, tucking your lock behind one of the stems so it would stay on. 

“You’re blushing,” he noticed, after you had jumped in shock at being touched. He pressed a hand against your warm cheek, smirking. You jumped away again, grinding your teeth.

“Fuck off, it… it’s cold!”


	7. VII - Lying

“How many times have you taken tesserae?”

You blinked as if it was obvious, then looked away. “Just once.”

He should’ve known. You were alone and only had to support yourself. You often shrugged it off, but you were so easy to read. You felt guilt for being fortunate — and then some for not having to support a family.

You returned the question, and he lied. You knew he was but didn’t question further, because you already knew the answer anyways. 

“May the odds be ever in our favour,” you sighed, and he repeated it. It was a lie, too.


	8. VIII - Rejection

“I got rejected by Flora. Again,” he told you glumly at lunch. You laughed, and held your hand out for the apple he promised you if you were right (which you were).

“Ah Mitch, when’ll you learn lil’ ol’ me will never reject such a handsome man like you?” you teased jokingly. 

He had yet to remind you he would do the same for you.


	9. IX - Stubbornness

It was the day of the reaping, and you were worried about one thing.

His shirt.

“Come on, Mitch. You have to look good,” you chided, holding up the freshly pressed button up he had thrown in a corner so you wouldn’t find it.

“What’s wrong with this?” he complained, gesturing at his tunic. 

You glared at him until he finally gave in, pulling on the tight shirt he hadn’t worn since he was eight. 

“God, you’re stubborn,” he said bitterly when you pushed him out his own front door. 

“It’s my best quality.”


	10. X - Façades

You had mastered the façade long ago, and he had mastered learning when to detect it. On the walk to the square, he saw your jaw tighten ever-so-slightly and your expression drop.

“You okay?” he asked.

“‘Course.”

He pulled his hand out of his pocket and let it brush against yours, and you clutched it immediately.

A façade is only the front of a wall, and yours was breaking.


	11. XI - Secret Walks

There was a little path in the restricted Meadow that led to an enormous (and peculiar) tree, surrounded by only grass littered with sweetly rotting apples. You liked to joke that an angel’s grace had fallen here, and maybe you’d grow wings if you were around it long enough. 

You also often took secret walks, and he had only learned of them when he discovered you tonight. You knelt, screaming for repent to the cruel gods all but you had lost faith in.

He sat beside you that night, and walked you to the tree every day since.


	12. XII - Sarcasm

Sarcasm was your way of coping, and he knew it.

“Oh, she looks _great_.” “Wow, the Peacekeeper’s raises are really working out for them.” “Oh, I _love_ mud on my shoes.” “Don’t mind me, a happy sunshine ray over here.”

You were worried about the reaping. When he separated from you at the entrance, he swiftly gave you a kiss on the cheek, to which you replied,

“U-um, _thanks_ Mitchy, I _really_ expected that.”

You kissed him back on the ear, clutching his collar once and then letting go.


	13. XIII - Crossed Fingers

Haymitch didn’t realize his fingers were crossed until they hurt, and he looked down. He didn’t uncross them. He tried to find your face after, but the insanely tall Maysilee beside you obscured you from sight. He breathed deeply. You’d get through this. Your slip was only in there once more than usual. He’d be more likely to get chosen before you. 

No biggie. 

“The male tribute from District 12…!” Some guy he didn’t know. He didn’t applaud, nobody did. He fingers squeezed together more.

“The female tribute from District 12…!”

He closed his eyes and waited.


	14. XIV - Protector

No.

He watched you, grief-stricken, edged out onto the side as people nudged you forwards. You finally remembered to move and stumbled, still processing as you tripped up onto the stage.

He was supposed to protect you. That’s what people do when they love somebody.

Yet still, as your eyes locked onto his, he knew then and there he had betrayed you and might as well die instead. 

“May the annual Fourty-Ninth Hunger Games begin!” the pink clad woman squealed, and he saw a tear drip down your cheek.


	15. XV - First Kiss

“Haymitch—”

He shushed you before you could say more, engulfing you into his lanky arms so he could feel you. You were shaking, your voice too.

He didn’t know how but he kissed you, his lips finally brushing against those he had desired for so long. He couldn’t process it in the time it took for you to get on your tippy-toes and curl your fingers in his hair, and he still didn’t when he was pulled away. 

“I love y—” he tried to say, finally understanding.

The door slammed, but you nodded back with a sad smile.


	16. XVI - Cold

It was cold in the winter of 12. It was cold when you left the district on the train, and it was especially cold in his bed.

He shivered whenever he saw you on the TV, still remembering the warmth of your fingers in his hair. He shuddered when you, the soft but dare-devilish girl who climbed trees in the Meadow aimed her gun and shot through dummies mercilessly. The girl made weapons so cruel he couldn’t quite comprehend, made faces so grim he couldn’t recognize.

She and Haymitch were both cold in different ways.


	17. XVII - Prayers

The day of the Games, he found only dread as the Television flickered to life in his living room. His parents and his baby brother joined in soon after, all watching him wearily from a distance. They knew you well — you joked with his father, gossiped with his mother and treated his brother like your own. 

“We’re praying for her,” somebody said to him, but all he could do was shrug it away. Prayers weren’t worth anything, he thought, watching you rise from your podium to the desert arena. Nothing he did could save you.


	18. XVIII - Hairstyles

As the 49th Hunger Games went on, Haymitch found himself focusing on your hair. You’d risen with it tied back neatly, but after a couple of days you lost the band and trekked through the arena with a mangled mop. You looked like a savage, and if you were sat beside him watching you would surely make a snarky comment about it. 

You weren’t, though. You weren’t even yourself, he decided as you glanced at a camera with wild hunger in your eyes. 

He tried to remember your hair as it was before as you began to sob to yourself.


	19. XIX - Cowardice

You displayed a strong sight of cowardice today.

A boy no older than 12 had approached you while you were fighting your way through the winter wasteland the Game makers had plotted for the year before a Quell. He fell, red blood from his arm leeching into the cold, fake powder. You could’ve easily killed him. 

You ran away.

He didn’t blame you. He only felt more misery as you dropped to your knees a few kilometers away, shrieking with hysteria.


	20. XX - Cruelty

At first, Haymitch assumed that the Games wouldn’t change you and there was a sliver of a chance that you’d return to him smiling and joking as usual. 

But as you stabbed that boy from earlier over and over, grunting with each time the femur of a wolf cracked into his skull, he realized you learnt true cruelty.

Nobody came back from cruelty.

And it was cruel that you, 15, had learnt it already.


	21. XXI - True Terror

Haymitch didn’t really know what true terror was until now.

You were cornered, a knife to your stomach, easily piercing your furred parka. You were howling in pain, your bloody fingernails clawing and scratching and your limbs flailing. Haymitch was shaking more than you were, his eyes wide before he closed them.

His heart pounded. His eyes throbbed. His ears roared. His brain hurt. His arms were weak.

True terror.


	22. XXII - Hardened

You limped away from the fight, your breath shallow through your teeth. It was pure luck that somebody had saved you, the other tribute from 12, and he disappeared without giving you so much as another look. 

You didn’t look in pain, though. You had hardened, countless nights of crying finally cracking you so far that you merely splintered. You pushed on, holding your severed skin together and walking on.

Haymitch missed your soft hands.


	23. XXIII - Furious

He saw red fury wash over you like nothing before.

You had managed to train a wolf from the arena — how, nobody knew, but it drew fans into a frenzy. Now that wolf was eating a girl that had killed your ally, and Haymitch was mesmerized by the splattering of blood before his father shook him to reality.

“She won. Haymitch, she won.”

Haymitch sunk deeper into despair. The girl that called her rabid dog named Mitch away from the still-hot corpse wasn’t you. She was furious and desperate, and _you_ , his love, was dead.


	24. XXIV - Emptiness

He felt emptiness as they announced you as the first ever victor from dirty dusty 12. His family was cheering but he was not, because all he felt was numbness inside. 

He stumbled away, outside, through the fence and down the Meadow to the oak tree where you and he would visit. He collapsed at the root where he had first found you, and sat there a while.

You won, but did you really survive?


	25. XXV - Broken Heartedness

“So,” Flickerman asked you, leaning into your face, “what motivates you?”

“There’s an idiot back in twelve,” you replied, putting on a winning crooked smirk that made it seem like you had secrets when in reality you were running on empty. 

“Oh? Do spill!”

“Yep. My… brother’s six-feet under. I’m gonna’ do my best and send him 23 other souls for company.”

Haymitch knew you were protecting _him_ , as he could read it in your desperate look at the camera. Haymitch knew you didn’t want the Capitol knowing of his importance to you.

But still, his heart cracked.


	26. XXVI - Eyes

“Well, little Missy from twelve has certainly paid her debt to six-feet-under!” Flickerman shouted to a cheering Capitol, a picture of you blowing up behind him. You looked grim but had a playful glint in your eyes, something that only drove the crowd wilder. They loved you, the Wolf Girl. _‘Crazy, with a hint of sexy animalistic passion.’_ That’s what they called you. Named you. 

Haymitch knew better. That shine, the little hint of smugness in your eyes wasn’t laughter. It was the last bit of hope left in your dead, dead eyes. 

It was gone now.


	27. XXVII - Possibilities

When Haymitch lined up at the square to catch a glimpse at the victor, he wished for a possibility. Just one little possibility that you’d be okay, that you’d run up to him and hug him and then you could both move on with your lives. 

He crossed his fingers again.

Just one, _fucking_ possibility that you would come off that train and say, “I love you”, to his face.

Was it too much to ask?


	28. XXVIII - Dead

As soon as the train pulled in, Haymitch was blocked by a taller man crossing his burly arms. Haymitch grunted in annoyance, trying to find a spot in the crowded square. He should be at the front, but something held him back. Fear.

Applause erupted suddenly, and he knew you’d stepped off. A hologram suddenly appeared above you, broadcasting it live. His breath caught as he realized he was finally able to see you again —

But he knew you were dead, because you had no smile. You nodded and bowed, and then left without a single word. 

He slumped.


	29. XXIX - Temporary Insanity

He found you sleeping at the dining table. Technically, he wasn’t even supposed to _be_ in your new house in Victor’s Village. But since you had no family and refused to take care of yourself, he found himself living here anyways.

Shaking your arm impatiently to wake you, he was flung back by a strong arm and a hand wielding a butter knife. You let out a strangled cry like you had in the arena, swatting at him with the dull cutlery.

That was when he learned that time can’t heal all wounds.


	30. XXX - Nightmares

Haymitch knew that you had troubles with nightmares, but never noticed it fully until now.

You woke up screaming and thrashing. He could only hold you down and murmur to you until you settled down, gasping for air.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, and he felt tears leaking out of your closed eyes. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” he knew the apologies weren’t for him. 

“I’m sorry, too,” he said to you, burying his face in your hair as you repeated your words without notice of his own muffled cries.

**Author's Note:**

> Elsewhere: https://goo.gl/BT4zgE


End file.
